University Catalog 2023-2024

Computer Networking

The Master of Science in computer networking may be earned through the M.S. with thesis option or through the non-thesis option. Either option may be used as preparation for further graduate study or employment in industrial research, development or design environment, although students planning to continue on for a Ph.D. should discuss the option selected with their advisors.

The Master of Science in Computer Networking is also available as on online degree program. This degree has a non-thesis option, does not require on campus attendance, and may be used in preparation for further graduate student or employment in an industrial research, development or design environment. The program is available to USA residents and to United States military personnel serving overseas and it is offered online through Engineering Online.

Master's Degree Requirements

Computer networking core courses constitute 9 of the 30 minimum credit hours. Students take 12 additional credit hours of computer networking courses from one of four currently defined technical concentration areas: network design, network hardware, network software, or networking services. The remaining 9 credit hours may be taken from an approved management concentration sequence, as additional courses in the computer networking technical concentration areas, or as 6 hours of thesis and 3 credit hours from the list of approved computer networking courses. At least 6 of the 30 credits must come from the 700 level, and non-letter graded courses such as individual studies courses may account for a maximum of 3 credit hours.

Faculty

  • B. Jayant Baliga
  • Mesut E. Baran
  • Salah M. A. Bedair
  • Subhashish Bhattacharya
  • Alper Yusuf Bozkurt
  • Gregory T. Byrd
  • Rada Yuryevna Chirkova
  • Mo-Yuen Chow
  • Huaiyu Dai
  • William Rhett Davis
  • Alexandra Duel-Hallen
  • Michael James Escuti
  • Do Young Eun
  • Brian Allan Floyd
  • Paul D. Franzon
  • John J. Grainger
  • Edward Grant
  • Robert Wendell Heath
  • Brian L Hughes
  • Iqbal Husain
  • Ki Wook Kim
  • Frederick Anthony Kish Jr.
  • Robert Michael Kolbas
  • Hamid Krim
  • Yuan Liu
  • Ning Lu
  • Srdjan Miodrag Lukic
  • Leda Lunardi
  • Thomas Kenan Miller III
  • Veena Misra
  • Rainer Frank Mueller
  • John F. Muth
  • H. Troy Nagle Jr.
  • Arne Nilsson
  • Omer Oralkan
  • Mehmet Cevdet Ozturk
  • Harilaos George Perros
  • Douglas Stephen Reeves
  • Eric Rotenberg
  • Mihail Lorin Sichitiu
  • Daniel D. Stancil
  • Michael B. Steer
  • J K Townsend
  • James Tuck
  • Daryoosh Vashaee
  • John Victor Veliadis
  • Ioannis Viniotis
  • Wenye Wang
  • Jonathan Wierer
  • Huiyang Zhou
  • Jacob James Adams
  • Dror Zeev Baron
  • Michela Becchi
  • Aranya Chakrabortty
  • Alexander G. Dean
  • Qing Gu
  • Ismail Guvenc
  • Khaled Abdel Hamid Harfoush
  • Michael W. Kudenov
  • Edgar Lobaton
  • Zeljko Pantic
  • Nuria Gonzalez Prelcic
  • David Ricketts
  • Nitin Sharma
  • Cranos M. Williams
  • Chengying Xu
  • Aydin Aysu
  • Amay Jairaj Bandodkar
  • Michael Daniele
  • Yaoyao Jia
  • Shih-Chun Lin
  • Spyridon Pavlidis
  • Bradley Galloway Reaves
  • Muhammad Shahzad
  • Wenyuan Tang
  • Chau-Wai Wong
  • Tianfu Wu
  • Gregory Edward Bottomley
  • Laura J. Bottomley
  • James Paul Dieffenderfer
  • Robert Joseph Evans
  • Rachana Ashok Gupta
  • Douglas C. Hopkins
  • Steven Wade Hunter
  • Steven D. Jackson
  • Bongmook Lee
  • David Lee Lubkeman
  • Robert Dwight Oden Jr.
  • Hatice Orun Ozturk
  • Veety,Elena Nicolescu
  • Tania Milkova Paskova
  • Andrew J. Rindos III
  • Elena Nicolescu Veety
  • Leonard Wilson White
  • Donna G. Yu
  • Wensong Yu
  • Winser E. Alexander
  • George F. Bland
  • David H. Covington
  • Tildon H. Glisson Jr.
  • John R. Hauser
  • Michael A. Littlejohn
  • David Franklin McAllister
  • Carlton M. Osburn
  • Wilbur Carroll Peterson
  • Sarah Ann Rajala
  • Wesley E. Snyder

Courses

CSC 570/ECE 570  Computer Networks  (3 credit hours)  

General introduction to computer networks. Discussion of protocol principles, local area and wide area networking, OSI stack, TCP/IP and quality of service principles. Detailed discussion of topics in medium access control, error control coding, and flow control mechanisms. Introduction to networking simulation, security, wireless and optical networking.

Prerequisite: ECE 206 or CSC 312, ST 371, CSC 258 and Senior standing or Graduate standing

Typically offered in Fall, Spring, and Summer

CSC 573/ECE 573  Internet Protocols  (3 credit hours)  

Principles and issues underlying provision of wide area connectivity through interconnection of autonomous networks. Internet architecture and protocols today and likely evolution in future. Case studies of particular protocols to demonstrate how fundamental principles applied in practice. Selected examples of networked clinet/server applications to motivate the functional requirements of internetworking. Project required.

Prerequisite: CSC/ECE 570

Typically offered in Fall, Spring, and Summer

CSC 574/ECE 574  Computer and Network Security  (3 credit hours)  

This course presents foundational concepts of computer and network security and privacy. It covers a wide breadth of concepts, including; Fundamentals of computer security and privacy, including security models, policies, and mechanisms; Cryptography for secure systems, including symmetric and asymmetric ciphers, hash functions, and integrity mechanisms; Authentication of users and computers; Network attacks and defenses at the network and application layers; Common software vulnerabilities and mitigation strategies; Secure operating systems and seminal access control models and policies; Principles of intrusion detection; Privacy, including considerations of end-user technologies.

Prerequisite: (CSC 316 or ECE309) and (CSC 401 or ECE407) or equivalent

Typically offered in Fall and Spring

CSC 575/ECE 575  Introduction to Wireless Networking  (3 credit hours)  

Introduction to cellular communications, wireless local area networks, ad-hoc and IP infrastructures. Topics include: cellular networks, mobility mannagement, connection admission control algorithms, mobility models, wireless IP networks, ad-hoc routing, sensor networks, quality of service, and wireless security.

Prerequisite: ECE/CSC 570

Typically offered in Spring only

CSC 577/ECE 577  Switched Network Management  (3 credit hours)  

Topics related to design and management of campus enterprise networks, including VLAN design; virtualization and automation methodologies for management; laboratory use of open space source and commercial tools for managing such networks.

Typically offered in Fall only

CSC 505  Design and Analysis Of Algorithms  (3 credit hours)  

Algorithm design techniques: use of data structures, divide and conquer, dynamic programming, greedy techniques, local and global search. Complexity and analysis of algorithms: asymptotic analysis, worst case and average case, recurrences, lower bounds, NP-completeness. Algorithms for classical problems including sorting, searching and graph problems (connectivity, shortest paths, minimum spanning trees).

Prerequisite: CSC 316 and CSC 226

Typically offered in Fall, Spring, and Summer

CSC 565/MA 565/OR 565  Graph Theory  (3 credit hours)  

Basic concepts of graph theory. Trees and forests. Vector spaces associated with a graph. Representation of graphs by binary matrices and list structures. Traversability. Connectivity. Matchings and assignment problems. Planar graphs. Colorability. Directed graphs. Applications of graph theory with emphasis on organizing problems in a form suitable for computer solution.

Prerequisite: CSC 226 or MA 351.

Typically offered in Spring only

CSC 579/ECE 579/OR 579  Introduction to Computer Performance Modeling  (3 credit hours)  

Workload characterization, collection and analysis of performance data, instrumentation, tuning, analytic models including queuing network models and operational analysis, economic considerations.

Prerequisite: CSC 312 or ECE 206 and MA 421

Typically offered in Fall and Spring

CSC 600  Computer Science Graduate Orientation  (1 credit hours)  

Introduction for new graduate students to (a) information about graduate program, department, and university resources, and (b) research projects conducted by CSC faculty.

Typically offered in Fall and Spring

CSC 776/ECE 776  Design and Performance Evaluation of Network Systems and Services  (3 credit hours)  

Introduction to the design and performance evaluation of network services. Topics include top-down network design based on requirements, end-to-end services and network system architecture, service level agreements, quantitative performance evaluation techniques. Provides quantitative skills on network service traffic and workload modeling, as well as, service applications such as triple play, internet (IPTV), Peer-to-peer (P2P), voice over IP (VoIP), storage, network management, and access services.

Prerequisite: CSC(ECE) 570 and CSC(ECE) 579

Typically offered in Spring only

CSC 777/ECE 777  Telecommunications Network Design  (3 credit hours)  

Analytic modeling and topological design of telecommunications networks, including centralized polling networks, packet switched networks, T1 networks, concentrator location problems, routing strategies, teletraffic engineering and network reliability.

Prerequisite: CSC(ECE) 570

Typically offered in Spring only

ECE 634  Individual Studies In Electrical Engineering  (1-3 credit hours)  

The study of advanced topics of special interest to individual students under direction of faculty members.

Prerequisite: Graduate standing

Typically offered in Fall, Spring, and Summer

ECE 695  Master's Thesis Research  (1-9 credit hours)  

Thesis research.

Prerequisite: Master's student

Typically offered in Fall, Spring, and Summer

ECE 766  Signal Processing for Communications & Networking  (3 credit hours)  

This course deals with the signal processing principles underlying recent advances in communications and networking. Topics include: smart-antenna and multi-input multi-output (MIMO) techniques; multiuser communication techniques (multiple access, power control, multiuser detection, and interference managment); signal processing in current and emerging network applications such as cognitive radio and social networks. Knowledge of linear alegbra and stochastic analysis is required.

Prerequisite: Graduate standing

Typically offered in Fall only